Choice
by Merula
Summary: VxM, WxM, Vash has to make a choice. One-shot. Sap, WAFF and angst.


Disclaimer: Trigun is not mine.  
  
This is an apology for making you guys wait on Revelations. I'm over the hump on that one, so hopefully that delay won't happen again. This is just a little piece I wrote one day. It originally ended worse than it does now. Kind of OOC, AU and sappy. I think it needs another chapter eventually...  
  
They never talked about it. Not once in all their travels together. Meryl often wondered why they didn't. But she never mentioned it, and neither did Millie. Of course, the men would never bring it up either. She tried to remember when it started, but couldn't. Millie had just not come back to the room one night. Oh, she was there in the morning, ready to work, but she had started spending her nights with the preacher. Not much later, Meryl had begun to share her bed with Vash. During the day, things were the same as they always were, no indications of change at all. They rented the rooms- Vash & Wolfwood, Meryl & Millie, but Millie would always go to join Wolfwood, and Vash would come to her.  
  
He was lying beside her, lightly snoring as usual, worn out from saving a town from a gang of thieves. His arms encircled her waist, holding her close in a way he'd never hold her in the daylight. He never even got close to her during the day, still called her 'small insurance girl', still picked fights - oh she knew why. Knives. If Knives suspected that Vash cared anything at all for her, she'd be dead.  
  
She studied the man lying beside her. Did he care for her? Or was he just lonely? Like she had been? She knew that Vash was a gentle man, someone who cared about everyone- but was she special to him? Or was this just... convenient? She lay quietly in the darkness, tears gathering at the corner of her eyes.  
  
Vash woke up to an unfamiliar sound. Unfamiliar sounds meant trouble- at least in his life. He blinked, trying to orient himself. Something was missing. He reached out a hand. No Meryl. The sheets next to him were cold. Panic seized him. He sat up. Meryl was sitting on the shabby couch under the window. She was just a shadow in the darkness, but she was here and unharmed. His panic eased. But the sound...? She was crying?  
  
"Meryl?" Vash's voice was soft, and she could hear the faint worry in it. "Are you all right?" She brushed at her tears.  
  
"I'm fine. I'm sorry, I didn't mean to wake you." He sat down next to her, tugging her back into the warmth of his embrace. He cuddled her close, his cheek on her hair. Meryl took a deep breath, feeling safe in his arms. She had always hated being short, but it had benefits, and being able to be completely enclosed in his arms like this was one of them.  
  
"Why are you crying? Are you okay?" He asked again. "Did something happen while I was sleeping?"  
  
"It's nothing, Vash, really." She couldn't tell him. "I'm just being silly."  
  
Vash looked down at the top of Meryl's head. Something was wrong. 'Silly' was not a word he'd ever use to describe her, so something had to be making her upset. Why wouldn't she confide in him? She shared her bed with him, why not her thoughts? Why was she shutting him out?  
  
"Meryl, you aren't silly. Something has hurt you. Was it- is it me? Did I do something?" He heard her take a deep breath and he felt cold. "That's it isn't it?" What had he done?  
  
Of course, of course, he had to be so damn perceptive. Meryl mentally cursed herself. "Meryl, talk to me." She took another breath.  
  
"I'm sorry, Vash. It's not you- "  
  
"If you finish that sentence with 'it's me' and tell me that we can't do this anymore, I am going to be a bit upset." Vash muttered. Meryl felt like laughing.  
  
"No..oh no... I wasn't going to say that," she reassured him.  
  
"Then what is it?" Vash leaned down to her ear. "And you'd better not say nothing or try and put me off." Meryl sighed.  
  
"It's just... I was thinking. We never talk about...this. Not ever. Millie and Wolfwood, you and me. Everyday we keep pretending that there's nothing... that..."  
  
"Meryl.." She put a hand up to his mouth.  
  
"I know why, of course..."  
  
"Why did that make you cry?"  
  
"We never... we... I don't know..." Meryl, to her surprise, teared up again.  
  
Vash held her against him as she cried.  
  
"Meryl, shhh, don't cry, don't." He murmured. Her tears began to ebb. "I can't speak for Wolfwood and Millie. I assume that they act the same during the day for the same reason we do. You are in danger now, but if he knew what you meant to me..." Vash trailed off, horrible images in his mind.  
  
"Do I... do I mean something to you?" Her question was voiced timidly and he cursed mentally at himself. He had been thoughtless. He should've said something to her after all this time, not just assumed that she knew how he felt.  
  
"Of course you do." He tilted her face up to his and kissed her. "Let me show you." He picked her up and carried her back to bed.  
  
The next morning, Vash and Wolfwood packed the car as Meryl and Millie finished up the town's insurance claims. Soon they were headed out of town, Wolfwood driving.  
  
Vash looked at Meryl. She was leaning on the car door, her chin on her arm, her eyes distant as she gazed at the sand. He wished he could reach out to her, ease the faint lines of tension in her body, but he didn't dare. Then he wondered who he thought he was fooling. He couldn't kid himself about how he felt for her, so how was he supposed to fool Knives? Knives knew him too well.  
  
"There's a town up ahead," Wolfwood called over his shoulder. "Want to stop for lunch?"  
  
"Sure," Vash replied. "Insurance girls?" Meryl nodded agreement.  
  
"I'm starving!" Millie chirped. Suddenly a bolt of pain shot through Vash and he double over, clutching his head.  
  
"What is it?" Meryl asked, frightened.  
  
"The plant... the plant is in pain...." Vash gasped. "Get me there- fast- or it'll explode!"  
  
When they arrived, they found the cause of the plant's distress:  
  
Knives.  
  
Knives was waiting for them by the plant, an amused smile on his face. The creature in the bulb was shrieking in agony. The townspeople stood silently watching, under Knives's control. When the foursome got out of their car, the townspeople let Vash go and face his brother, but grabbed on to the other three. Wolfwood, Millie and Meryl didn't resist. They didn't want to hurt innocent people.  
  
"How can you hurt one of our sisters?" Vash demanded as he faced his brother.  
  
"Just an experiment," Knives replied calmly. "I wanted to see if you would rush to the aid of our siblings as fast as you rush to aid the parasites."  
  
"And I did, so stop hurting her!"  
  
"Kill one of your pet insects for me, and I will stop." Knives smiled as Vash's eyes widened.  
  
"No."  
  
"Come now, one sacrifice for so many?" Vash closed his eyes and tried to reach the panicking plant, but Knives had him blocked. Wolfwood struggled against his captors, but they held on to him tightly. Millie was also fighting, in vain, but Meryl was watching the brothers, her eyes calm.  
  
"I said no!"  
  
"Then our sister dies and the city with her!"  
  
"Knives, you can't do this!"  
  
"Yes, I can, brother. If you won't kill one of your friends, then I will kill the city." The brothers glared at each other.  
  
"He can kill me," Meryl spoke up quietly. "If he shoots me, then you'll stop hurting the plant?"  
  
"Are you crazy?!" Vash protested.  
  
"Will you?" Meryl asked, her eyes focused on Knives. He looked thoughtfully back at her.  
  
"Yes, I will. I admire you, Miss Stryfe, for volunteering."  
  
"How do I know you'll keep your promise?" Meryl asked him, her voice gentle, with no hint of accusation.  
  
"You'll have to trust me, I'm afraid," Knives replied, just as calmly. "I don't think there's any oath I could swear that will ease your mind."  
  
"Yes, there is." Meryl nodded. "You can swear by your brother's life. I'll believe that oath." Knives smiled. Vash was listening in horror.  
  
"You are a very interesting specimen, Miss Stryfe. Very well. I swear on Vash's life that the town will be safe. The plant will not explode, as long as he kills you. Though how are you going to manage that?"  
  
"Have them let me go?" Meryl asked. Knives nodded and she shrugged off the hands that held her to approach Vash.  
  
"Ma'am!" Millie cried. "NO!"  
  
"I won't shoot you," Vash told her as she stopped and stood in front of him. "I don't care what you say." He pointed his gun at the ground.  
  
"Two minutes, Miss Stryfe," Knives drawled.  
  
"Vash, this city is full of people. People who will die if you don't." Meryl's violet eyes gazed up into his.  
  
"There has to be another way!" Vash shook his head.  
  
"There isn't another way. When Knives rigged the ships to fall, was there another way for Rem to save them without sacrificing herself?" Meryl asked, and Vash's eyes burned.  
  
"I... I don't know!" But he knew there hadn't been. There had been no time to do anything else.  
  
"There wasn't." Meryl smiled at him, her eyes sad. "We're running out of time, Vash, you have to do this." She reached down and turned his gun towards her chest. Her hand touched his where his fingers rested on the trigger. Vash looked up at his brother. The one who had taken Rem from him. The one who was about to take Meryl from him. The one who had been a source of pain and suffering for him and everyone else on this planet.  
  
"Well, brother?" Knives asked, voice amused as he watched Vash's face twist with pain. "You have 30 seconds..."  
  
"Ma'am!" Millie cried out again. "No, Mr. Vash!" Wolfwood had increased his struggling, his eyes alight with fury.  
  
"Tongari!"  
  
"Vash, please. There's no other way." Vash looked down at Meryl, eyes sparkling with tears.  
  
"I love you," he said, and pulled the trigger.  
  
Meryl had been looking up into his eyes, aching for him, seeing the pain and torment. The gun went off, and silence fell. Meryl was still looking up at Vash, eyes wide.  
  
"Vash...." she murmured. "I'm so sorry..." He slid his fingers over her cheek gently.  
  
"It was my only other choice," he replied, his voice tired. He looked up and over her to where Knives lay bleeding in the dirt. The plant's alarms had ceased, the people holding Millie and Wolfwood let them go and fell over, unconscious. Wolfwood grabbed the cross punished and opened it, the machine-gun end pointed at Knives.  
  
"Vash... you shot me..." His brother's voice was weak. The wound was serious, but not life-threatening. Just enough to break his brother's concentration.  
  
"You made me choose, Knives."  
  
"And you.... chose them.... again...." 


End file.
